Chemical Engineering Commons^™

Detection And Thermal Stabilization Of Virus Based On Surface Properties, Xue Mi

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

Viral diseases take the lives of millions of people each year. The most effective methods to prevent viral disease outbreak are viral detection to reduce contact with viral pathogens and vaccines to prevent disease. To reduce the costs of the detection of viruses and improve vaccine formulation, we explored viral surface properties. The properties we have focused on are viral hydrophobicity and surface charge using chemical force microscopy (CFM). CFM is a single-particle technique that measures the adhesion force of a functionalized atomic force microscopy (AFM) probe, and in this study, a virus covalently bound to a surface. The non-enveloped …

Continuous Viral Vaccine Manufacturing And Viral Detection Strategies, Dylan G. Turpeinen

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

Viruses are responsible for many human diseases that lead to suffering and death. Acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), influenza, and coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) have claimed the lives of millions of people. Two methods have been created to reduce the suffering caused by these diseases. The first is the manufacturing of vaccines that prevent disease and the second is the development of virus detection tests that lead to treatment. The work summarized in this dissertation discusses the development of a continuous virus purification process using an aqueous two-phase system for use in vaccine manufacturing. Additionally, two novel virus detection methods were …

Virus-Like Particle Vaccine Manufacturing From Yeast, Ananya Ananya

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

Influenza virus has an intrinsic nature to undergo mutations. Hence, there have been struggles to combat this disease since the time when the worst influenza pandemic first hit in 1918. Vaccines have proved to be effective in controlling the spread of the influenza A virus by providing herd immunity. However, the contemporary design of influenza A virus based on egg and cell-culture is not efficient in tackling influenza A virus transformation. Virus-like particles (VLPs) have established themselves as a potental platform for future vaccine candidates. VLPs have all the credentials to supplant contemporary vaccine designs without compromising on immunogenicity. For …

Gravity-Drawing Flexible Silicone Filaments As Fiber Optics And Model Foldamers, Katherine Snell

CMC Senior Theses

Here, we present a method of gravity-drawing polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) silicone fibers with application as fiber optics and as model foldamers. Beginning as a viscous liquid, PDMS is cured using heat until its measured viscosity reaches 4000 mPa•s. The semi-cured elastomer is then extruded through a tube furnace to produce thin (diameters on the order of hundred micrometers) filaments with scalable lengths. PDMS is biocompatible, gas-permeable, flexible, and hydrophobic. Additionally, the PDMS surface hydrophobicity can be modified via UV exposure, O2 plasma, and corona discharge. We demonstrate the patternibility (i.e patterns of hydrophobicity) of PDMS fibers, adding complexity to potential foldamer …

Selective Adsorption Of Rare Earth Ions From Aqueous Solution On Metal-Organic Framework Hkust-1, Liang Zhao, Xiaoguang Duan, Muhammad R. A. Azhar, Hongqi Sun, Xiangchen Fang, Shaobin Wang

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

Recovery of rare earth ions from wastewater holds an important strategy for the use of the precious resources. In this study, we found that a metal-organic framework (MOF), HKUST-1, exhibited a high affinity and selectivity towards adsorptive recovery of rare earth ions (Ce3+ and La3+) in aqueous solutions. The adsorbent showed a remarkable adsorption capacity of 234 mg/g and 203 mg/g for Ce3+ and La3+ at pH = 6, respectively. More importantly, its adsorption selectivity of the rare earth ions was about 87% against other metal ions. The adsorption isotherm, kinetics, and mechanism in the process were also investigated. The …

Why Do I Have To Know This? Engineering In A Globalized Society, Caleb Cunningham

Honors Theses

Through a pilot comparative study, this thesis examines the problem-solving of chemical engineering students and chemical engineering faculty. Specifically, the thesis examines the extent to which individuals include global factors (cultural, social, environmental, and economic) into their engineering solutions as specified by ABET. Several hypotheses were investigated in this pilot study: (i) having a study abroad experience would increase the likelihood that participants included the global factors of interest, (ii) the type (PUI, Research Intensive, Unique) of institution students attended would impact how individuals approached the problem, (iii) students with similar career aspirations would approach the problems similarly, (iv) having …

Comparative Scoping Study Report For The Extraction Of Microalgae Oils From Two Subspecies Of Chlorella Vulgaris, Jasmine Kreft, Eric Moe, Nicholas Garcia, Andrew Ross, Wayne Seames

Chemistry Faculty Publications

The production of microalgae as a fatty acid oil resource for use in biofuels production is a widespread research topic at the lab scale. Microalgae contain a higher lipid content on a dry-weight basis compared to oilseeds such as soybeans. Additionally, the growth and cultivation cycle of microalgae is 15 days, in comparison to soybeans, for which the cycle occurs once or twice annually. However, to date, it has been uneconomical to produce microalgae oils in a world-scale facility due to limitations in cultivating microalgae at commercial scales. Recent developments suggest that the use of heterotrophic microalgae may be economically …

Data Analytics Of Natural Gas Injection Enhanced Oil Recovery For Unconventional Reservoirs, Ali Waqar

Masters Theses

"Unconventional Enhanced Oil recovery, via the injection of natural gas has attracted great attention, as studies and projects have shown to be promising. An overview of pertinent studies has been carried out. Core Scale Laboratory Experiments, Core Scale Simulation, Field Scale simulation and pilot projects are analyzed. Data is collected for Core, Reservoir, Operational, and recovery information. Thereafter, Data analysis techniques are applied to identify data ranges, distributions, trends, relationships, and to eventually reach conclusions.

Huff and Puff injection is the preferred mode of injection, delivering most promising results for unconventional reservoirs. Across all the studies, with increase in amount …

Evaluation Of Eor Potential Of Low Salinity Polymer In Enhancing Heavy Oil Recovery On The Alaska North Slope, Shize Yin

Masters Theses

"Alaska's North Slope (ANS) contains vast amount of viscous oil resources that have not been extracted. This study focuses on the investigation over the potential shown by low-salinity polymer flooding in improving the recovery of ANS heavy oil through laboratory experiments.

At the beginning, coreflooding experiments were performed with silica sandpacks. The synergy between low-salinity water flooding and polymer flooding was proved, and the low-salinity polymer showed a better performance than the normal-salinity polymer. Further, the sandpacks prepared with formation sand from an oilfield on the ANS was then employed so as to simulate the reservoir condition. A series of …

Towards Efficient Water Treatment: Mechanism Of Colloidal Fouling Of Ultrafiltration Membranes, Ikenna Henry Ozofor

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

This research study first reviewed challenges of conventional and membrane separation systems for water treatment. Though membrane separation systems appeared superior to the conventional counterparts for water and wastewater treatment, wider applications of membrane systems have been limited by some factors, most notably is membrane fouling. Experimental studies were therefore conducted to achieve the goal of this research, which is to investigate how feed properties affect fouling of ultrafiltration (UF) membranes by colloids.

Feed salinity, pH, and nanoparticle concentration were the variables studied to unravel how different UF membranes are fouled by model silica colloids (with average diameter of 25nm). …

Virus Purification Framework And Enhancement In Aqueous Two-Phase System, Pratik Umesh Joshi

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports

Viral infections regularly pose detrimental health risks to humans. Preventing viral infections through global immunization requires the production of large doses of vaccines. The increasing demand for vaccines, especially during pandemics such as COVID-19, has challenged current manufacturing strategy to develop advanced unit operations with high throughput capability. Over the decade, the upstream processing responsible for synthesizing viral products in cell cultures has shown significant success in yielding high titers of viruses and virus-like particles. The progress in the upstream stage has now shifted the bottleneck to the downstream processing (DSP). Overlooked for decades, the DSP responsible for viral product …

A Review Of Carbon Dioxide Adsorption To Unconventional Shale Rocks Methodology, Measurement, And Calculation, Sherif Fakher, Abdulmohsin Imqam

Geosciences and Geological and Petroleum Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Carbon dioxide (CO₂) injection has been applied extensively in hydrocarbon reservoirs for both increasing oil recovery and CO₂ storage purposes. Recently, CO₂ injection has been proposed to increase oil recovery and for CO₂ storage in shale reservoirs. During CO₂ injection in shale reservoirs, adsorption will take place on the surface of the rock, which will impact both the oil recovery and the storage capacity. This research provides a roadmap to the different types of adsorption and the adsorption measurements and calculations with emphasis on the ones most applicable during CO₂ injection in shale …

A Comparison Of Fiber Mat Thickness Measurement Techniques Using Laser Interferometry And Water Displacement, Ryan Seabeck

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

Polymer fiber mats may often be very thin which leads to complications in measuring thickness. The thickness of fiber mats, however, is crucial in understanding their behavior. Thickness affects how well the mat works as a filter as well as the pressure drop across the mat, and herein lies the need for accurate measurement techniques. Currently two of the available techniques for measuring mat thickness are by laser interferometry[1] and by buoyancy force when submerged in water[2]. Instead of measuring the buoyancy force in this experiment, an enclosure intended to measure the thickness via water displacement was …

Chloride Effect In Fly Ash Geopolymer Cement, Evan Dimmick

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

The production of ordinary portland cement (OPC) poses a significant impact on the world's carbon dioxide emissions through the wide global use of concrete. Geopolymer cements (GPC) made from alkali activated fly ash can serve as a replacement to OPCs, reducing the carbon dioxide emissions by as much as 80%. GPCs exhibit adequate or superior mechanical performance to OPCs. The corrosion of carbon steel rebar in concrete occurs largely from chloride ion attack. The focus of this project will be to experimentally determine the coefficient of diffusion for chloride ions in GPCs and OPCs and compare to the corrosion performance …

Exploring Shape-Memory Polymers From Silicone I And 1,10-Decanediol Blends, Kristina Nguyen

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

Shape-memory polymers (SMPs) are polymeric materials that have dual-shape capabilities. These materials can deform to a temporary shape and will recover to their permanent original shape when induced by an external stimulus such as heat. The purpose of this project was to investigate the thermo-mechanical properties and shape-memory behavior of various blends of Silicone I and 1,10-decanediol to determine if a unique blend of these components can be utilized to develop shape memory surface relief patterns.

Careful iterative experiments were used to develop a robust procedure for the fabrication of crosslinked sheets of blends of Silicone I and 1,10-decanediol over …

Utilizing Virtual High-Throughput Screens To Identify Promising Inhibitors Of Complement Factor C1s, Lyndsey Schmucker

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

A large study was conducted to identify possible drug candidates to treat various diseases using computer algorithms, virtual high-throughput screens, and experimental validation of activity. Since the algorithm has the capability to screen millions of compounds, it is beneficial to pharmaceutical development as it allows a larger pool of compounds to be considered that would have otherwise been overlooked. As part of this larger study, this project attempts to identify drug candidates to treat human complement factor C1, a protein which causes tissue damage when underregulated¹. A series of designed experiments validate candidates and confirm the performance of …

Design Of Pigments For Use In “Cool” Coatings, Tyler Laughorn

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

This project was focused on the development and testing of several novel pigments that exhibit high NIR-reflectance and therefore show potential for use in “cool” coatings. A “cool” coating will reflect more solar radiation than other standard coatings, and so a coated structure would require less energy to keep cool. Four sets of pigments were synthesized: Co_1-xMg_xCr₂O₄ (teal), Co_0.25Mg_0.75Cr_2-yAl_yO₄ (blue), Ti_1-x-yNi_xSb_yO₂ (yellow), and Cr_2-xFe_xO₃ (black). NIR and TSR values were then measured …

Filtration Apparatus Design For Oil-Water Separation Using Membranes And Sponges, Alec Jerger

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

It can be difficult to separate water and oil emulsions through traditional filtration. Therefore, investigations of filtering using thermo-responsive (TR) polymers, in this case poly(vinyl methyl ether) (PVME), was conducted. It’s hypothesized that below its lower critical solution temperature (LCST), PVME has an affinity for water while oil substances do not. Above the LCST the opposite will be true. To verify this hypothesis, iterations of filtration designs were created to provide optimum control over the parameters to measure flow. The final optimized experimental apparatus was a Chromaflex glass column which was air tight and controlled all parameters besides fluid flow. …

Effects Of Hofmeister Ions On Solubility And Swelling On Gelatin Hydrogels, Hannah Eldridge

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

Hydrogels are known to be weak and brittle, due to the amounts of water that they hold. Gelatin-based hydrogels specifically are inexpensive and easily accessible, but often have poor physical properties. The goal of my project was to strengthen gelatin-based hydrogels and improve their mechanical properties by forming these hydrogels in different aqueous solutions containing kosmotropic Hofmeister's ions. Prior research has shown that these ions are able to take water away from gelatin-based gels, which forms a tougher hydrogel. The success of this project will be measured by studying the solubility and swelling effects that different Hofmeister ions have on …

Testing The Effectiveness Of Reflective "Cool" Pigments, Ashleigh Carpenter

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

This project is an exploration of reflective "cooling" pigments used in coatings for the exterior of a structure in order to control the temperature inside. The pigments reflect sunlight to reduce the heating effect inside a structure. While the project will include the synthesis and testing of these pigments, the focus will be on the design and construction of an apparatus to test the effectiveness of these pigments. An apparatus will be constructed with a heat source and two structures of identical dimensions. The set-up will allow for the temperature of the inside of the structures to be recorded at …